PART II 
The Government’s Record in Slum Clearance 
" While the housing of the working classes has always been a 
question of the greatest social importance, never has it been so 
important as now. It is not too much to say that an adequate 
solution of the housing question is the foundation of all social 
progress. Health and housing are indissolubly connected. If 
this country is to be the country which we desire to see it become, 
a great offensive must be undertaken against disease and crime, 
and the first point at which the attack must be delivered is the 
unhealthy, ugly, overcrowded house in the mean street, which 
we all of us know too well. 
" If a healthy race is to be reared it can be reared only in healthy 
homes ; if infant mortality is to be reduced and tuberculosis 
to be stamped out, the first essential is the improvement of housing 
conditions ; if drink and crime are to be successfully combated, 
decent, sanitary houses must be provided. If ‘ unrest ’ is to be 
converted into contentment, the provision of good houses may 
prove one of the most potent agents in that conversion. . . 
So spoke the King by the advice of his present Ministers 
on nth April, 1919, at the start of the Government 
Housing Scheme. Let us see what the Government 
have done to make good His Majesty’s words. 
The law on the subject is clear. The 1919 Housing 
Act provided that all schemes technically known as 
Part I and Part II. i.e., Schemes providing for the 
clearance of slums and of unfit houses, were to be 
financially assisted by the Treasury precisely in the 
same manner as Part III Schemes (i.e., schemes for 
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